Forensic Veterinary Medicine in Italy: the fight against animal crimes through the use of smartphones

On 21 October 2022, the General Directorate of Animal Health and Veterinary Medicines of the Ministry of Health will present the new smartphone application "Poisoned Bait", created in collaboration with the National Reference Center for Veterinary Forensic Medicine of the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale of Lazio and Toscany (IZSLT), for the prevention and control of the phenomenon of intentional poisoning of domestic and wild animals.

The prevention and the fight against the intentional poisoning of animals are very important issues in our country, which claims state-of-the-art animal protection legislation in the world.

In 2021, 4,434 new cases of malicious animal poisoning were reported.

Very high numbers, which have grown in recent times and have become evident also thanks to the information technologies reporting tools made available to veterinarians, law enforcement agencies and the judiciary, such as the National Portal of Willful Poisoning of Animals , active since 2019, conceived by the Ministry of Health and carried out with the IZSLT, aimed at managing poisoning cases and monitoring the phenomenon through the network of Institute Zooprofilattici Sperimentali distributed throughout the national territory.

The Portal has made it possible to map this criminal phenomenon in real time, in its temporal and spatial distribution, providing the Authorities in charge of law enforcement with the ideal tool for effective repression and prevention.

From next October, this tool will be joined by the free application for smartphones, both Android and iOS, "Poisoned Bait", which will allow citizens to send the authorities geo-referenced reports of suspected poisoned baits or morsels scattered throughout the territory.

Program

 Il Centro di Referenza Nazionale per la Medicina Forense Veterinaria IZSLT (CeMedForVet)

Source: IZSLT